University of Virginia Library

19. XIX
BILLIE AND JOHNNIE'S SISTER

WELL, you all happened to be good children to-day, or I couldn't tell you, now, how Billie and Johnnie Bushytail found a little sister, after their papa and mamma came back to them, escaping from the cage where the boy had them.

It was this way: Grandpa and Grandma Lightfoot were so glad to see Mr. and Mrs. Bushytail back, that they hardly knew what to do. You can also imagine how delighted the two little boy squirrels were, to say nothing of Jennie Chipmunk, who smiled so — well, I'm really afraid to tell you how much she smiled and laughed, she was so happy.

“Now,” said Papa Bushytail, “we must get a nest of our own, for you boys have visited your grandparents long enough.”

“Yes,” said Mamma Bushytail, “I shall be glad to go to housekeeping again. Boarding in that cage, with the wheel that went around so fast, did not please me at all. We must find a nest at once.”

So, though Grandma and Grandpa Lightfoot would have been glad to keep the Bushytail family longer, it was decided that it would be best to live in separate nests, but not far away from each other. Papa Bushytail managed to find a nice home for his family in a hollow tree, lined with soft leaves and grass, which a squirrel had given up to go South for the winter. There Johnnie and Billie went to live, and the very first morning they awakened in their new home something very strange happened.

Billie was the first to get up, but Johnnie was not far behind him, and as they looked out of the hole in the tree they heard a funny little noise on the ground. They looked down, but they couldn't see anything.

“What was that?” asked Billie, and he sniffed the air and wiggled his little whiskers to see if he could discover any danger.

“I don't know, unless it's Bully, the frog,” answered his brother.

“Bully doesn't squeak that way,” said Billie. “I'm going down to see.”

“Maybe it's an owl,” spoke Johnnie, “Better call grandpa — Oh, no, I mean papa,” he said quickly. You see he forgot for a moment that he was in his new home.

“No, he's asleep yet; don't wake him up,” went on Billie. “Let's go down and see what it is,” and all the while the funny little squeaking noise kept up.

So the two little squirrel boys scampered down the tree to the ground, and the noise kept getting louder and louder, until they could hear it quite plainly, and then they could tell that it came from a little bunch of leaves at the foot of the tree.

“Who's there?” asked Billie, as bold as bold could be.

“It's me,” answered the little squeaky voice, and what should come out of that bunch of leaves but the cunningest, nicest, darlingest little squirrel you ever say. Oh, it was just as nice as it could be! But, Oh! so little and shivery and trembling, and it was crying! Wasn't that too bad?

“Who are you?” asked Johnnie, and he spoke very softly to the baby squirrel, for he didn't want to frighten it.

“I am Sister Sallie,” replied the baby squirrel, and she stopped crying at once, because

[Description: Full page color illustration by Louis Wisa. Two squirrels in jackets sit at the base of a tree, looking at another, very small squirrel.]

Johnnie's voice was so gentle, which shows that you should always be gentle to those smaller than you are.

“How do you know your name is Sister Sallie?” asked Billie. “You are so little I shouldn't think you would know.”

“Oh, yes, I know,” the baby squirrel said. “I was named that by a little girl when I was quite a baby. She was going through the woods, where I used to live, and eating peanuts, and she sang a little song that went:

“And just then she dropped a peanut for me, and so I knew my name was Sister Sallie,” went on the little squirrel, drying her eyes. “My name's been that ever since.”

“That isn't the way I learned that verse,” said Johnnie. “Besides, it was all an accident, anyway. The girl didn't mean you.”

“Hush!” exclaimed Billie, who didn't want to hurt Sister Sallie's feelings. “Tell us how you came to be here all alone and why you are crying,” he went on.

So the little squirrel told how her papa and mamma had become ill and died, and how she had no one to look after her, so she became an orphan just like Jennie Chipmunk. Then Billie and Johnnie felt very sorry for Sister Sallie. They ran right up to the nest and cried:

“Mamma! Papa! We have found a little sister!”

Wasn't that good of them? At first Mr. and Mrs. Bushytail were much surprised, but they took in little Sister Sallie, and gave her some nice, warm breakfast of nut pudding,

and said she could always live with them, and be a sister to Johnnie and Billie. So that is how they found a little sister, and to-morrow night, if I do not have the toothache. you shall hear about Sister Sallie's doll.